Thomlex

Go is one of my favorite board games. It's very well-known in China, Japan and Korea, but not as much so in the west.

One of the things that I find particularly appealing about it is that the rules are extremely simple (you can learn to play in a half-hour), yet the number of possible positions is enormous, astronomical compared to chess for example. As a result, even though there are computers that have beat the world's best chess players, a computer program has not yet been written that can beat even a mediocre professional go player.

Also, it has a very simple handicapping system, such that a very advanced player can play a beginner and if the handicap is set up fairly, you'd expect each to win half the games played. My six year old son and I play this way, and it's a lot of fun because we're evenly matched.